Approval of a tentative labor
deal that could remove one of the final roadblocks to privatizing Stockton's water
operations has been delayed a week but should be completed shortly, a union leader said
Monday.

The City Council was slated to consider the
proposed agreement behind closed doors at its meeting last Tuesday, but council members
emerged from their private session without an approval.

Dean Cofer, a representative of International
Union of Operating Engineers Local 3, said negotiators needed to make a few minor changes
involving effective dates.

"We've requested a couple of changes, a
little sugar to help the medicine go down," Cofer said, "nothing that should
hold up an agreement on either side."

Assistant City Manager Gary Ingraham, who
often has taken the lead role in Stockton's privatization dealings, was unavailable for
comment Monday. Both he and Cofer have declined to discuss any deal specifics, although
the labor leader said the agreement addresses the sticky issue of severance packages for
municipal utility workers, who will become private employees.

Under its 20-year contract with the city,
international conglomerate OMI-Thames agreed to hire most of the approximately 100
municipal workers with the same or better pay and benefits.

Cofer said the deal will be taken to union
members for a ratification vote after it's approved by the council. As of Monday, union
negotiations were not listed on tonight's council agenda.

Unionized municipal workers have been
frequent critics of the OMI-Thames contract, which some believe could worsen their
long-term pay, benefits and work conditions.

The union originally filed a lawsuit asking a
judge to block the contract from taking effect until the city reached a settlement with
its workers. Union attorneys withdrew that lawsuit recently, and Cofer said the legal
threat will disappear completely when the city agrees to a deal.

That would leave only a lawsuit brought by
the Sierra Club and the anti-privatization group Concerned Citizens Coalition of Stockton,
which contend that the city did not adequately consider the environmental effects of its
contract with OMI-Thames.